Liturgy Wars

Well, it’s not quite that bad. But it’s a bad situation. You may think it’s just in your parish, but it’s not only there.

Just last week, a new book was published in Italy and Cardinal Robert Sarah, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, wrote the preface. Rita Ferrone in Commonweal quotes the cardinal:

[W]e can understand how the most insidious diabolical attack consists in trying to extinguish faith in the Eucharist, sowing errors and favoring an unsuitable manner of receiving it. Truly the war between Michael and his Angels on one side, and Lucifer on the other, continues in the heart of the faithful: Satan’s target is the Sacrifice of the Mass and the Real Presence of Jesus in the consecrated host.  . . .

Why do we insist on communicating standing in the hand? Why this attitude of lack of submission to the signs of God?

Talk about conflicts about the liturgy taken to a cosmic level! In this case, the Cardinal wants to return to communion on the tongue, and Ferrone alludes to what I, at least, have observed: Eucharistic ministers adapt to whatever the communicant indicates, without the angels coming to blows. A peaceful solution. Ferrone also documents the long histories of standing up and communion in the hand, which is typical of those who support the Vatican II changes in the liturgy. They do a lot of research and don’t mind being critical of pious practices that grew up in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries. Those who love that piety react, though perhaps not as dramatically as Sarah. He represents those who want to “reform the reform,” though apparently he was instructed not to use that term.

I want to explain why I think the liturgy is so important for women seeking ordination and equality in the church. The words we use matter. Debates like the above show just how far our movement is from the decision-makers in the church, yet if we believe that the spirit is acting through us, we must support these efforts. They establish a foundation for future action – as the liturgical reformers have done for almost a century now.

After my post “Winning the Battle, Losing the War,” two people asked if I could give more background: one about why the awkward translation was made and one about why we could not have a bit more elevated language.

The awkward translation is the temporary victory of the “reform the reformers.” You can still access the Misguided Missal website, which has much information about the adoption of the 2011 English translations. I may go back to that in future posts, but I am only a part-time historian. I am also a part-time futurist, working for more change in the church, and I want to focus on positive signs.

Sarah’s move to promote communion on the tongue is a manifestation of conservatives in Rome seeking to challenge liturgical reform. Pope Francis has taken them on about translations. In an August speech to the Italian National Liturgical Week, reported by Vatican Radio,

“there is still work to do in this direction, in particular rediscovering the reasons for the decisions made with the liturgical reform, overcoming unfounded and superficial readings, partial receptions, and practices that disfigure it.” He said that this is not a question “of rethinking the reform by reviewing its choices, but of knowing better the underlying reasons [for it]… [and] of internalizing its inspirational principles and of observing the discipline that governs it.”

The Supreme Pontiff insisted, “After this magisterial, and after this long journey, we can assert with certainty and magisterial authority that the liturgical reform is irreversible.”

This whole quote does not sound like a ringing endorsement, but it puts a marker down. We are not going back to pre-Vatican II liturgy. “Irreversible” is a very strong word, and what it means in practice will have to be seen. The Pope supports the kind of research Ferrone and others present.

And then there is Vatican politics. I alluded to it in my Battle/War post. There was another move by Sarah last September in which he “appeared to minimize the changes” Pope Francis had called for in Magnum Principium, according to Richard Gaillardetz in NCR. That was the document that changed the authority for liturgical translations from the Vatican to bishops’ conferences. The Pope said he, indeed, intended to revise the 2001 norms that had centralized the translations. And he wanted his letter to be published in “every media outlet in which Sarah’s commentary had appeared,” according to Gaillardetz. Does this suggest exactly how much the Pope wanted to correct Sarah? (I do wonder if this is even possible with today’s web.)

NCR gathered a whole series on Magnum Principium, including a few that go way back. One by Michael Sean Winters suggests that the underlying meaning is that Pope Francis wants Vatican officials to “get on board.”

My musings on liturgy will continue. It’s the life of the church, millions of people around the world sharing the Eucharist every Sunday. We must enrich this experience as we move to be more present in it. We can watch the liturgy wars in the Vatican but we can be peace warriors in our parishes when we understand what has been and what can be.